


Forgetting is Easy; Remembering is Harder

by butterfly_wings



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Karl Jacobs-centric, M/M, Memory Loss, Stream of Consciousness, Time Travel, Winged Alexis | Quackity, no beta we die like tommyinnit, oh yeah another karl losing his memory fic, the in between, u know what this probably ooc and also probably goes against canon but i had fun writing this so
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-28 07:20:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30135972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butterfly_wings/pseuds/butterfly_wings
Summary: At some point, Karl stops remembering things.
Relationships: Alexis | Quackity/Karl Jacobs/Sapnap
Comments: 3
Kudos: 65





	Forgetting is Easy; Remembering is Harder

**Author's Note:**

> this is about their characters within the canon lore of the dream smp, and is in no way intended to represent the relationship between the irl karl jacobs, alex quackity, and sapnap.

Karl falls out of the In Between and lands on the ground with a gasp. His head is pounding and the world spins slightly as he stands up to re-orient himself with the world he’s found himself in.

He peers out the window and frowns. It looks like home, but it feels wrong. Sure, there’s books everywhere, and the walls are the familiar wood of his library, something is wrong, and he can’t tell what.

Spurred by the sense of wrongness tugging in his gut, he makes his way out of his library and looks around. There’s an unfamiliar flag, with a mushroom on it. He frowns. His library…shouldn’t it be somewhere else? He doesn’t know that flag. Maybe something happened and he forgot. But it’s hard to imagine that he would have forgotten moving locations. Right? He wouldn’t have forgotten something as important as that, right?

He frowns, turning around as he takes in the grasses around him. There’s so many plants, vines and flowers growing everywhere. But he doesn’t see any people.

Someone has to be around here, right?

“My name is Karl,” he says softly, just to remind himself. Right. He’s Karl. And this flag…it must be his.

His library is small brown building amongst the mess of green that forms the land. It’s a kingdom, he thinks, although the name escapes him.

Wait. His library. He stores information there. His journals.

He can’t believe he forgot.

He rushes back inside and makes his way to the backroom, with the familiar purple and green carpet. Yes. He knows this room; it’s his.

At least one thing is familiar. At least he knows something.

He digs through the journals, flipping through the pages in search of answers. Something will tell him; something will tell him where he is. All he knows is that he’s not where he should be.

A quick search reveals that he moved his library to Kinoko Kingdom. It’s his kingdom, and the residents of El Rapids, Sapnap and George, moved with him.

What happened to El Rapids?

Karl frowns. He hasn’t written anything about El Rapids, just that it had been taken down and that he had formed Kinoko Kingdom with Sapnap and George. His library had been moved because the In Between had told him to do it, although it had been overgrown with vines as well.

Is he overthinking things?

Why was El Rapids gone?

He sighs. The In Between was getting weirder and weirder, with intense warnings to stay on the path. It was so empty too; he hadn’t seen anyone else, yet he swore that someone was there.

He thought that he’d seen someone there, before. But maybe not. There hadn’t been anyone there the last time he had gone, either.

And then there was the room underneath the tree.

He thinks that he left something there, something precious to him, but he doesn’t know what. It escapes him, and that scares him.

He just left the In Between, and already he can barely recall what he did there. Even the memories of what happened before the In Between are growing hazy.

He can’t afford to forget those memories. Karl grabs a pen, flips open to the next clean page in his journal, and starts scribbling down as much of his adventure as he can remember. The people he met, their stories…the things they did….

Did he help them? He hopes so. The details are getting fuzzier now, but he thinks that it was a happy ending. Not everything was sad, right? Right.

He finishes scribbling down the story and makes his way out of his library. Now to find his friends. They’ll help him re-orient himself until the next time he’s tugged back through time, or forward, as the case seems to be.

There’s so much surrounding him as he makes his way along, leaving behind Kinoko Kingdom as he does. He spies statues of Tommy and nothing but Hilary Clinton on the sign where Sapnap and their friend (what was his name? Oh, right. George) once lived (and what was it called? He had known, once, but the name is escaping him). Quackity had been the one to name it.

Quackity. Karl can feel a smile tugging on his lips as he recalls Quackity’s smile. That’s right, Quackity is his fiancé. How come he hadn’t thought of Quackity when he first returned?

Where was Quackity, anyways?

And where was Sapnap?

Was he alone?

No, he wasn’t. He was home, and his friends had to be around here somewhere. They wouldn’t have left him alone, right?

No. Sapnap and Quackity wouldn’t do that to him. Karl shakes his head. No matter how many times he’s sucked into a different time, they’ve always been there for him. They’re his friends–no. His fiancés (that's what they are, right? Does he have a ring? Did he lose it?). They’re probably just busy.

Wasn’t Quackity going to visit Dream? Karl vaguely remembers hearing something about that, but he can’t recall when that was. Had Quackity done that? Had Sapnap? Heck, had Karl? He’ll have to ask them. How long was he gone, this time? What happened while he was away? Was he getting his timelines jumbled? Where was Manberg?

He rakes a hand through his hair. What a silly thought. Manberg had fallen. He’d been there when it happened; had fought in the Pogtopia-Manberg war. Why was he wondering where Manberg was? The ruins of Manberg had been the location of his former library, but with the red stuff everywhere, he’d had to move. That’s how he’d ended up in Kinoko. He remembered that, now.

And what was with this red stuff all about anyways? It hadn’t spread to Kinoko Kingdom, yet, but the more he moved north, the more of the red vines were everywhere. It reminded him of something, a secret room behind a painting and laughter from…someone. He couldn’t recall his name, just a vague pink outline.

No matter. It was probably in his journals. At least, he hoped it was in a journal.

It would be awful if he hadn’t written it down, but he was meticulous. That was the whole point of the library: to ensure that he wouldn’t forget. He wanted to remember his adventures, so if there was ever a time where he forgot, he’d be able to read about the things he’d seen.

Even so, he makes his way over to a poster. The poster says something about being pro-omelet, which, interesting. He doesn’t recall any fighting about omelets.

Do Quackity and Sapnap like omelets? At some point, he probably knew the answer, but it escapes him right now. He’ll just have to ask. Assuming he remembers to, of course. But he can worry about that later. The more important question is what happened to them? Where are they? What’s going on?

His gut lurches, and Karl closes his eyes as the familiar sensation of getting tugged through time washes over him. When it stills, he opens his eyes and looks around.

Where is he?

There’s a tall, tall building ahead of him, and he doesn’t recognize it. What happened to him? When did he get here? What happened to the omelet poster? How much longer is he going to have to keep doing this?

He explores the building, meeting new people and helping them out best he can, before he’s once more tugged into the In Between.

The building looms white and beautiful above him, and he floats in. Should he stay on the path? Should he go off of it? Are things going to be okay? Is he going to be okay?

He follows the journals. Some of them are frantic, some of them calming; all of them are unsettling. He doesn’t know what to make of them. How can he? Did he write them? The handwriting is familiar, but it could be because he keeps coming here.

One of the journals tells him that things he put under the tree are safe; that no harm will befall them.

But what did he put under the tree?

But before he can find out, he falls out of the In Between and into a room with a purple and green carpet and an absurd number of books.

There’s two people sitting there; one with golden duck wings and a wry smile, the other with a bandana around his dark hair and a concerned look on his face.

Something rises in Karl’s heart at the sight of them, and he feels a grin tugging on his mouth. Home, he thinks. He made it back. Hadn’t he been looking for them? Right. He had been wondering if they liked…eggs?

“There he is!” the winged one says, rising to his feet. “We’ve been looking everywhere for you, Karl.”

He opens his mouth to say, “So was I”, but stops. His smile falls.

“What’s your name?” he blurts out, instead.

“Karl?” The other person asks. “What…what do you mean?”

“Where am I?” Karl asks, looking around. “This isn’t…this isn’t.” His voice trails off. He can’t tell anyone about the In Between; can’t tell anyone about the time traveling. Desperate, he switches topics. “I’m safe, right?”

“This isn’t funny, Karl,” the winged man says. “First Tommy, and then Schlatt, and Dream, and now you–“

“I’m safe, right?” Karl asks again. But he knows the answer to that. He trusts these two men, even if he doesn’t know who they are. “I’m safe. I just…I just don’t know who you are.”

“We’re your fiancés.” The man with the bandana gets to his feet and grabs Karl’s hands. “I’m Sapnap, and that’s Quackity. We’re in Kinoko Kingdom.”

Karl blinks. He’ll ignore the fiancé thing for now. “I’ve never heard of Kinoko before.”

“You made it,” Sapnap says. “You built it. Moved your library, too, and then just…vanished.”

Karl freezes. This room is his? For what?

“Why?” His voice shakes. 

“You record things,” Quackity says, voice rising. “You like to keep records of things, of what you do and the people you met. That’s why you have this place. You moved it because the last one was overgrown. What do you mean, why?”

“The In Between,” Karl blurts out. “The In Between. I have to get back; I left something there.”

“Left what?” Sapnap asks. “Where’s the In Between? Does it have anything to do with the egg?”

“I don’t know, but it was important,” Karl says. “I have to get it.”

“You can’t!” Quackity’s voice breaks. “You don’t seem to remember anything! You forgot us! You just, poof! Out of nowhere, come back into your library, and say that you don’t know who we are?” 

“My name is Karl. You’re Quackity, and that’s Sapnap.”

“You only know that because we told you!”

“I’m so sorry, but I can fix this, I promise.” Karl grabs a journal and starts flipping through the pages. “The answer should be here somewhere.”

“What should?” His fiancés are hovering near him, both curious and worried, but Karl doesn’t have time to worry about it. He knows now.

The room underneath the tree had asked him to leave things there.

He has to get them back now.

“Whatever it was that I left behind,” he says. “It’s safe in the In Between. I’ll be able to remember, there.”

“Promise?” Quackity asks.

“Of course.” Karl grins. “I promise everything will make sense later. I just…I just need to get it.”

“R-right.” Something flickers in Sapnap’s eyes, but he reaches out and laces his fingers in Karl’s. “Do you want help?”

Warmth rises in Karl’s stomach at the way Sapnap is looking at him. When he glances over at Quackity, he realizes that there’s concern in the other’s eyes as well.

He smiles, even as he swallows the yes that was bubbling up. There’s no way he’s dragging them into this, no matter what their relationship is. Just because they feel safe in way he hasn’t felt in a long while does not mean that he should tell them everything. “I got it. Thank you, though.”

A few days later, Karl lands in a beautiful white building. There’s a gorgeous sunset, lighting the sky with oranges and pinks. He walks along the path, content to explore the building. It’s large, with delicate white walls and elegant marble columns.

He pauses before a giant tree that’s covered in white blossoms. This tree is important, isn’t it? After all, what else could a tree that large be doing here?

Well. It doesn’t matter. He turns away and continues wandering around the castle. Endless rooms open up before him as he walks through twisting hallways and countless staircases.

It’s not like he has anywhere important to be, after all. He’ll get to where he needs to be soon.

After all, he’s a time traveler. That’s just how it works. He simply has to trust the In Between.

The tree looms in front of him again. He doesn’t remember walking back there, but he must have, somehow. It’s a really nice-looking tree, he thinks.

He wonders why tears are starting to roll down his face. Had something happened there? What secrets did the tree hold?

What had he forgotten?

And why did it feel like he wouldn’t be able to go home unless he found out what secrets that tree held?

**Author's Note:**

> SO THAT QUACKITY LORE HUH 
> 
> yall im pretty new to the dream smp and as a result i barely know what's going on but im obsessed with time traveler karl so we fucking are. i wanted to work in some of quackity's lore too (bc holy shit that was a fucking stream) but again,,,idfk what's going on and i feel like i don't have a good enough grasp on the quackity to write him properly (and sapnap, for that matter), so ur usual karl-centric memory loss fic it is :,) hope this wasn't too ooc~ 
> 
> unrelated but i listened to quackity's dream diss track for p much the entire time i wrote this. i almost called it "suck it green boy ur a little hater bitch". quackity drop the full dream diss track challenge
> 
> ty for reading!


End file.
